macrumors 6502

I've had this happen on a number of 2012 iMacs. I've been through 4 of them and 3 had IR issues and all had odd issues with Target Display mode and the backlight sometimes activating, but most of the time not.

The IR would generally happen anytime I had a second monitor running from the iMac and had been using it for a number of hours (not a static screen for hours, but just constant use and no hibernation). I could tell when it would start to happen simply because I could interlacing in the screen on the mac desktop image.

Some machines were worse than others, but it seems to happen to far too many to ignore for me. I'm finally returning the 4th one and just getting a refund. This one has not been bad at all, but has shown IR twice in the two weeks I've had it and the Target Display issues are just concerning as well.

macrumors 6502a

What other devices do you have connected to your iMac? I want to know everything there is about it. Do you have a second display connected?

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From the looks of your forum interest and posts you're a fairly intelligent chap. Please lets remain so - this is an issue caused by faulty screen manufacture.

No matter what is connected to the logic board, what programs you have used or even sites you have been browsing will cause this issue.

I will make one leap - I bet it's LG displays just like the Retina Macbooks.

The graphics card is also not the culprit - if it were processing a different screen over an exisiting app, game whatever, then why on earth would it produce a faint - ghosted image so similar to polarisation of a panel?

This is the same issue MacBook Retina owners are/have faced.

The fact that LG have still not moved to fix this is poor.

Asking the OP machine spec will not be of any help unless we can some how ascertain the panel manufacturer, anyone a terminal junky?

macrumors 603

From the looks of your forum interest and posts you're a fairly intelligent chap. Please lets remain so - this is an issue caused by faulty screen manufacture.

No matter what is connected to the logic board, what programs you have used or even sites you have been browsing will cause this issue.

I will make one leap - I bet it's LG displays just like the Retina Macbooks.

The graphics card is also not the culprit - if it were processing a different screen over an exisiting app, game whatever, then why on earth would it produce a faint - ghosted image so similar to polarisation of a panel?

This is the same issue MacBook Retina owners are/have faced.

The fact that LG have still not moved to fix this is poor.

Asking the OP machine spec will not be of any help unless we can some how ascertain the panel manufacturer, anyone a terminal junky?

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Hey now! There have been numerous reports from forum members that having a second display attached causes some IR. The reasons for this I have no idea. That's all I was getting at in my response.

macrumors 6502a

I just received my iMac 27-inch today. 3.4GHz i7, 24GB Memory, 3TB Fusion and 680MX 2GB graphics. Happy to report that there were no image retention issues after doing the test, bootcamp install also went without a hitch. Windows 8 by the way.

macrumors 6502a

i dont care if no one believes me or not but ALL iMacs have SOME image retention some are worse than others. Like some of them you really need to look for it but they all have it, ive so far tested around 20-25 of them they all have them to a certain point.

macrumors 6502a

This seems the most relevant place for me post this comment. What displays are the new iMacs using are they LG or Samsung?

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They're all LG. Samsung doesn't make 27" IPS panels. Their 27" panels are MVA and PLS. Image retention is nothing new with the 27" iMacs. I have seen 2009 27" iMacs with terrible image retention. The interesting thing is that Dell has used the same 27" LG panels as Apple, and image retention doesn't seem to be an issue with them.

macrumors 68020

macrumors 68020

They're all LG. Samsung doesn't make 27" IPS panels. Their 27" panels are MVA and PLS. Image retention is nothing new with the 27" iMacs. I have seen 2009 27" iMacs with terrible image retention. The interesting thing is that Dell has used the same 27" LG panels as Apple, and image retention doesn't seem to be an issue with them.

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you probably dont see any image retention on the dells because of 3 inches of antiglare coating on the screen. the grain washes it away. =P

macrumors regular

i dont care if no one believes me or not but ALL iMacs have SOME image retention some are worse than others. Like some of them you really need to look for it but they all have it, ive so far tested around 20-25 of them they all have them to a certain point.

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I want to echo this. I went through 4 units that all had image retention\persistence before giving up and asking for a full refund. I worked with an Executive Customer Support agent that finally told me after my 4th unit that ALL 2012 iMacs WILL show some level of image persistence because of the fact that they're using IPS displays. I'm not a display expert in any way so take that as you may. I'm just speaking from my experience and from what Apple is telling me. I know that some people are claiming to have perfect screens with no persistence issues but Apple stance seems to be that persistence will occur because it's inherent to IPS displays.

They're all LG. Samsung doesn't make 27" IPS panels. Their 27" panels are MVA and PLS. Image retention is nothing new with the 27" iMacs. I have seen 2009 27" iMacs with terrible image retention. The interesting thing is that Dell has used the same 27" LG panels as Apple, and image retention doesn't seem to be an issue with them.

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In my experience with the 4 units that I mentioned above it seemed like the IR would occur after the unit was on for a while. I think heat has something to do with it. Perhaps this new super thin redesign doesn't do as good of a job at dissipating the heat away from the display as other models or Dells offerings.

macrumors 603

I want to echo this. I went through 4 units that all had image retention\persistence before giving up and asking for a full refund. I worked with an Executive Customer Support agent that finally told me after my 4th unit that ALL 2012 iMacs WILL show some level of image persistence because of the fact that they're using IPS displays. I'm not a display expert in any way so take that as you may. I'm just speaking from my experience and from what Apple is telling me. I know that some people are claiming to have perfect screens with no persistence issues but Apple stance seems to be that persistence will occur because it's inherent to IPS displays.

In my experience with the 4 units that I mentioned above it seemed like the IR would occur after the unit was on for a while. I think heat has something to do with it. Perhaps this new super thin redesign doesn't do as good of a job at dissipating the heat away from the display as other models or Dells offerings.

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It still seems to me that the folks here that have image retention in their homes/offices have image retention with ALL their replacements, too, which leads me to believe something else is afoot. I can't say this for sure, of course, but...

In my case, I've used six 2012 27" iMacs and not a single one had anything like image retention, and they were used quite heavily too to test, including torture tests with that grid-pattern from one of the other threads. I've NEVER seen IR on my 2012 iMacs, and I've also never seen it on my 2009 27" iMac which I used for 3 years straight, and never ever got shut off.

Note I'm extremely picky about my devices, so if IR would ever to occur I'd pick up on it immediately.

macrumors 6502a

Willam make a video not screen recording but a recording of the iMac itself turn off screen savers and set the screen to never shut off go to a site with a white background like vimeo or something that has mostly white. Make that page half screen leave it there for 10 mins then go to choose a color for your background make it gray come back to this forum and show the video uncut and share it with us ill believe it when I see it. Like I said some will have worse than others but they ALL have this problem if you this you will find this out too. Now weather you don't want to look for it or not that's a whole other issue.

macrumors 603

Willam make a video not screen recording but a recording of the iMac itself turn off screen savers and set the screen to never shut off go to a site with a white background like vimeo or something that has mostly white. Make that page half screen leave it there for 10 mins then go to choose a color for your background make it gray come back to this forum and show the video uncut and share it with us ill believe it when I see it. Like I said some will have worse than others but they ALL have this problem if you this you will find this out too. Now weather you don't want to look for it or not that's a whole other issue.

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Your wish is my command. I took a video of this for about 13 minutes or so, recorded with the iMac at max brightness. No image retention. Feel free to watch the video. Note I've also done this for far, far longer in the past, using the grid-pattern test as well.

While the first video was uploading, I did the grid pattern test, too, for just under 10 minutes (I got bored). No image retention. A while ago I ran this image for almost an hour with no image retention.

macrumors 6502

Your wish is my command. I took a video of this for about 13 minutes or so, recorded with the iMac at max brightness. No image retention. Feel free to watch the video. Note I've also done this for far, far longer in the past, using the grid-pattern test as well.

While the first video was uploading, I did the grid pattern test, too, for just under 10 minutes (I got bored). No image retention. A while ago I ran this image for almost an hour with no image retention.

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